Leading off a column regarding the state of football with a 1970s song reference is a little odd.

But so am I, so here we go.

In the ballad American Pie, Don Maclean laments the “day the music died” in reference to the 1959 plane crash that claimed the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson.

That event was tragically significant and shook rock ’n’ roll, still in infancy, to its core. It did not, however, hinder its growing popularity, never mind sound its death knell.

Stay with me now as I draw my cross-cultural parallel.

Everyone knows that football has taken a beating in recent times. Bounty hunters in the Big Easy, horrible revelations of sexual abuse and subsequent cover-ups at Penn State and the shocking suicide of Hall-of-Famer Junior Seau top the list.

Add academic scandals, lawsuits by former pros and drug abuse, and it doesn’t paint a pretty picture.

My analogy is actually somewhat flawed. A single-event accident is not the same as a list of loosely connected and very diverse issues.

Still, it has comparative value because they both involve a cultural phenomenon of mass appeal suffering through a very dark chapter. For football, the key questions to be asked include: Are these problems systemic and entrenched? And if so, can they be rectified?

At the risk of sounding Nixonian, let me make two things perfectly clear.

One is that a part-time columnist does not an investigative journalist make. I’m not qualified to make grandiose statements on important topics such as suicide, child sexual abuse or the use of performance-enhancing drugs. I’ve also never seen the inside of an NFL locker room.

However, as player-turned-coach I’ve been around the game for 40 years. That may not make me an expert, but it does make me someone who sincerely cares about the game and its future.

Second, these issues are complex and can never be properly analyzed by the 24-hour news cyclists, no matter how hard they try. Case in point was the death of Seau. As I’ve learned from a friend who is qualified to speak on the topic, suicide is a multi-layered event. Even if well-meaning, arm’s-length conjecture about causes or motives is risky at best and harmful at worst.

Even after extensive investigation, a criminal trial and a historic NCAA ruling, the scandal at Penn State, with its myriad of issues, will take months if not years to fully comprehend.

Subtext such as institutional accountability, the danger of coaches-cum-demigods and the corruptive influence of big-time profits all need to be thoroughly examined.

The answer to that key question then is that we don’t know . . . yet. It’s simply too early to tell.

But football will survive and here’s why.

The most obvious reason is that in the United States football is king. Whether you examine TV ratings and revenue streams, job creation (in and out of the stadium) or the participation rate of players and gamblers alike, football isn’t going anywhere. Fan or not, numbers just don’t lie.

For me, a more important reason is that it is truly a great game. Issues such as responsible leadership and player safety need to be scrutinized more than ever, but football is a sport that blends the intellectual and athletic abilities of players, both big and small, in a unique way. That uniqueness is what re-energizes me each and every September.

Finally, as I was reminded when I took my little nephew to practice recently, the game is filled with really great people.

Coaches who are not just passionate but have a sincere desire to create a positive life experience for their players. Parents who want the same. And kids who unapologetically enjoy the game for the pure fun of it.

Given the gravity of recent headlines, I will not be Pollyanna about the future of football. It has serious challenges ahead.

But here’s hoping that similar to the crash of ’59, a dark year on the calendar is followed by brighter days.

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Brian Totzke is a teacher and coach at Sir John A. Macdonald.
You can follow him on Twitter @sjamguy.